YouTube earnings calculator.

How the estimate works

The calculator divides your views by 1,000 and multiplies by a range of RPM figures (revenue per 1,000 views) for the kind of audience you pick. For long-form videos it then scales the result by the share of your views that carry ads, compared with the 53% the benchmark channels averaged. If you type your own RPM from YouTube Studio, that replaces the range: your Studio RPM already counts views with no ads.

The default long-form range is $1.35 to $4.16, the middle half of music channels in AIR Media-Tech’s study of 300 channels from May 2025 to May 2026, with a median of $2.28. The lower end starts at $0.50, where vidIQ puts music channels. For Shorts, vidIQ gives $0.01 to $0.07 per 1,000 views, and AIR’s Shorts figures by country run from $0.008 in India to $0.328 in the US. AIR works with the channels it studied and vidIQ sells creator tools, so treat these as their figures.

RPM and CPM are not the same number

YouTube’s ad revenue analytics help defines the two. CPM is what advertisers spend per 1,000 ad impressions, before YouTube takes its share. RPM is what you earn per 1,000 views, after YouTube’s share, and it counts every view, including views with no ads. RPM also includes YouTube Premium, channel memberships, Super Chat and Super Stickers. It leaves out merchandise and brand deals.

That is why a CPM of $10 does not mean $10 per 1,000 views to you. Use RPM to estimate earnings.

What YouTube keeps

• Long-form videos. Partners receive 55% of the net revenue from ads on their videos’ watch pages, according to YouTube’s partner earnings overview.
• Shorts. Ad revenue from the Shorts Feed is pooled each month. Shorts that use music send part of their revenue to music partners, and creators keep 45% of what is allocated to them by their share of engaged views, according to YouTube’s Shorts monetisation policies.
• Eligibility. Ad revenue sharing starts in the YouTube Partner Program: 1,000 subscribers plus 4,000 qualified watch hours in the last 12 months, or 1,000 subscribers plus 10 million qualified Shorts views in the last 90 days. YouTube then reviews the channel.
• Claimed music. If a song is matched by Content ID, its owner can earn from ads on the video, so the money may reach you through your distributor or label instead of your channel.

Views you pay for

Ads that promote your video bring views, but the arithmetic rarely pays for itself. The YouTube promotion cost calculator uses published costs of $0.004 to $0.05 per paid view, which is $4 to $50 per 1,000, while a typical music RPM is $1.35 to $4.16 per 1,000 views. Our guide to what YouTube pays per 1,000 views for music covers this in more detail, and YouTube Shorts for musicians covers Shorts. Promotion is worth doing for reach: new people hearing the song, subscribing and looking you up, not for the payout on the views themselves.

How Blue Leopard Media can help

We run music videos as Google Ads campaigns on YouTube, aimed at people who watch similar artists, and add an editorial feature about you on one of the publications we work with. Music marketing starts at $249 for a worldwide campaign and one feature, with a Google Ads report every week. We don’t sell streams, and we can’t tell you what YouTube will pay you: that depends on your audience and your channel. The feature is sponsored content, labelled as such, as our disclaimer states.

If you have a release coming, book a free 15-minute call about how we would run it.